Movie Thread

[Donny B.]

I suppose the biggest thing for me is that even after the prequels I came out of the cinema feeling in awe.

Awe in the sense of how much those movies sucked ass?

No, awe in that I actually enjoyed the films for what they were as part of the wider story, even though they weren't anywhere near as good as the first films. I remember being with my friends leaving the cinema after episode 2 being deeply excited about the film and what was to come. The same friends and I went to see TFA and didn't have anything near the same reaction - I'd say we were split down the middle between my views and the current wider prevailing view.

The prequels have grown to be more critised and slated over time. So will TFA.

Perhaps, but the prequels were very much slated at the time too. You're the first person I've ever heard of who actually liked them.

[fourthirtythree]

I'm guessing you must have been still quite young when you saw the prequels if you felt anything for them at all that wasn't along the lines of contempt. I didn't see the turd one - revenge of the sh!t- but I watched the first two and they were really dreadful films. Quite unbelievably bad. The romance in the second (i think) was knuckle chewingly bad. I came out of the first one in awe, or something, that they thought Amos Andy Binks was a good idea, but distinctly unimpressed rather than awestruck at Naboo - a cheap digital knockoff of DW Griffith's Babylon set for Intolerance. Which they actually built nearly a century before. It really made me sad at the substandard, second rate, third hand fare that was being passed off for awe.

[Hippo]

I'm guessing you must have been still quite young when you saw the prequels if you felt anything for them at all that wasn't along the lines of contempt. I didn't see the turd one - revenge of the sh!t- but I watched the first two and they were really dreadful films. Quite unbelievably bad. The romance in the second (i think) was knuckle chewingly bad. I came out of the first one in awe, or something, that they thought Amos Andy Binks was a good idea, but distinctly unimpressed rather than awestruck at Naboo - a cheap digital knockoff of DW Griffith's Babylon set for Intolerance. Which they actually built nearly a century before. It really made me sad at the substandard, second rate, third hand fare that was being passed off for awe.

All of this.

[FLIP]

I wasn't all that young at all, and I am capable of distinguishing between a film that's disappointing in context to a series (which both the prequels and TFA are) and extremely bad films full stop.

Surely if I had bad taste I'd like all of them, and all the other shite Abrams has pumped out over the years.

[Oldschoolsocks]

I wasn't all that young at all, and I am capable of distinguishing between a film that's disappointing in context to a series (which both the prequels and TFA are) and extremely bad films full stop.

Surely if I had bad taste I'd like all of them, and all the other shite Abrams has pumped out over the years.

That's it youngfella, you stand up for yourself.

[fourthirtythree]

I wasn't all that young at all, and I am capable of distinguishing between a film that's disappointing in context to a series (which both the prequels and TFA are) and extremely bad films full stop.

Surely if I had bad taste I'd like all of them, and all the other shite Abrams has pumped out over the years.

Well your taste is yours and you are, of course, absolutely right no question.

But... taste isn't that important, I'm sure you can dig out the Picasso quote on taste and art.

I didn't point by point answer your criticisms of the new one in your spoiler tag. Mostly because all the w&%k about spoilers just irritates me and if we are going to stifle debate to keep the babies happy let's just accept it. But anyway, most of those criticisms apply to the first three. The foreshadowing, the copy paste plot, the music (it's the same f%~king music. A pastiche of Korngold, who was a knock off of the execrable bombast called Mahler - just hum Mahlers death march and the imperial march back to back) it's just that you watched them as a kid when your critical faculties and your range of references were restricted. You want bad staging and cinematography? Go look at the later edits of the trilogy with the real action relegated to a letterbox in the bottom of the screen while Lucas adds in a load of immediately dated digital clutter distracting attention from the actors and the action. The empire, as originally released suffers none of that as it was directed by a pro. The first couple were edited by Walter Murch and his wife and done right. As he (Lucas) got complete control the films suffered.

Abrams made Star Trek like it was Star Wars and made a right mess of them. Unforgivably bad.

But. If you look at the first 30 minutes of the first ST Abrams made, it's really good. He has an ability to economically deliver the exposition and a sympathy with the characters and their histories while also allowing them to be updated subtly which boxed well for Star Wars. I think he delivered that. But then he has to do plot, and as anyone who suffered through more than a few hours of Lost would notice, he gets lost in an unholy mess with plottiness delivering pointless complexities that are labyrinthine and unengaging and profoundly silly.

Star Wars doesn't really have that problem as it is based on a ruthlessly minimal structural anthropological dissection of story, the only story. The hero's journey. All the elements are by design cliches, or memes if you prefer. In Lucas's case derived from pulp serials reflected through this high concept lens and actualised by a visual storyteller steeped in the movies and their lore.
I disagree with Lucas's (and Campbell's, his script guru) beliefs, but obviously I'm wrong and three billion people are right!

Edit: alright, here's a massive big Star Wars spoiler:

Show Spoiler:

. http://imgur.com/topic/Star_Wars/7xc3hat?forcedesktop=1

[Donny B.]

Watched "Concussion" yesterday and it was no great shakes.
Would say a lot of that movie ended up on the cutting floor so they could have more about Will Smith's budding romance with his wife (which I ended up fast-forwarding through).
Luke Wilson, playing Roger Goodell (Yeah, I know), appears in the movie about as much as he's in a trailer.
Paul Reiser is in it, as a sleazy doctor, for literally one line.

Also they've invented lots of scenes like a confrontation between Dave Duerson and Smith's character, which robs the film of a lot of credibility. It will take the NFL spin doctors about 10 minutes to tear it apart.

They won't be bringing down the NFL with this blunt tool....

[Donny B.]

When I heard the running time of The Hateful Eight (167 minutes), I really wasn't looking forward to it.
I expected another over-long, over-indulgent Tarantino movie just like Inglourious Basterds (cr@p and overlong) and Django Unchained (good but went on an hour too long) before it.

So I was pleasantly surprised to find I really enjoyed it and would say it's his best film since Jackie Brown.
It's effectively a filmed stageplay but the characters and the dialogue are so well done, it held my attention until the inevitable bloody conclusion.
Sam Jackson and Jennifer Jason Leigh are the stand-outs but hopefully it will also bring the brilliant TV actor Walton Goggins (The Shield, Justified) to the broader audience he deserves. Also nice to see two old Reservoir Dogs Tim Roth and Michael Madsen in a return to form after some of the cr@p they've been in recently.

Doubtless it will divide people and the critics in the US weren't that keen, but personally I loved it.

[TerenureJim]

Hateful 8 was good but it could have lost an hour, thank god there was no Tarantino cameo

[Peg Leg]

Hateful 8 was good but it could have lost an hour, thank god there was no Tarantino cameo

Mr narrator

[fourthirtythree]

When I heard the running time of The Hateful Eight (167 minutes), I really wasn't looking forward to it.
I expected another over-long, over-indulgent Tarantino movie just like Inglourious Basterds (cr@p and overlong) and Django Unchained (good but went on an hour too long) before it.

So I was pleasantly surprised to find I really enjoyed it and would say it's his best film since Jackie Brown.
It's effectively a filmed stageplay but the characters and the dialogue are so well done, it held my attention until the inevitable bloody conclusion.
Sam Jackson and Jennifer Jason Leigh are the stand-outs but hopefully it will also bring the brilliant TV actor Walton Goggins (The Shield, Justified) to the broader audience he deserves. Also nice to see two old Reservoir Dogs Tim Roth and Michael Madsen in a return to form after some of the cr@p they've been in recently.

Doubtless it will divide people and the critics in the US weren't that keen, but personally I loved it.

Interesting: I may just watch it so. I wasn't as I hated Inglorious b$&%@#ds (I hated it so much I was rooting for the Nazis to kill Brad Pitt) and had no love at all for Django Unchained, Hated both Killings of Bill so gave the one in between a miss. Deathproof? I just may go to this one if it's on the Jackie Brown end. I loved that. And the first two obviously, but I was young then and maybe now they wouldn't appeal as much?

Didn't Tim Roth play Sepp Blatter in the FIFA movie or something like that? A classic case of Michael Caine Jaws 4 "I haven't seen the film but I believe it's a very bad film. I have seen the house I bought with the money from it and I have to tell you it is a very lovely house" I think he said it paid for his kids college.

[Donny B.]

Didn't Tim Roth play Sepp Blatter in the FIFA movie or something like that? A classic case of Michael Caine Jaws 4 "I haven't seen the film but I believe it's a very bad film. I have seen the house I bought with the money from it and I have to tell you it is a very lovely house" I think he said it paid for his kids college.

He did. Sam Neill also took a part in it. Two fine actors who revealed themselves as shameless hoors for a paycheck, which is what nearly 99% of actors are really.

Gerard Depardieu did take a part as well but he's so desperate these days, they probably just paid them in Russian hookers.

By the way 433, don't go to H8 on my recommendation. If you don't like it, your online rebuttal could be too fierce to bear!!!

[Donny B.]

Hateful 8 was good but it could have lost an hour, thank god there was no Tarantino cameo

Mr narrator

Yeah and brief though it was, the obnoxiousness still shone through

[fourthirtythree]

By the way 433, don't go to H8 on my recommendation. If you don't like it, your online rebuttal could be too fierce to bear!!!

I am you know, and it's all your fault if it goes wrong
I tend to trust people on films more than anything else. My preferred movie reviewer finds it long and boring (and he's the kind of person that digs Bela Tarr...) but you and a couple of other people have tipped the balance.

That said there is the syndrome around wanting someone to be good: how often do you read initial reviews of an album being a "return to form" only for it to be universally recognised as shite later? As I said, I trust some people, so it's all your fault.


and QT is incapable of making a movie with as bad dialogue, without focus on the actors and the story, with as uninteresting a story, with as unconvincing performances... as George Lucas did. Just not possible. Oh, and the music couldn't be as sh!t. Not, not, not, possible.

[Morf]

Didn't Tim Roth play Sepp Blatter in the FIFA movie or something like that? A classic case of Michael Caine Jaws 4 "I haven't seen the film but I believe it's a very bad film. I have seen the house I bought with the money from it and I have to tell you it is a very lovely house" I think he said it paid for his kids college.

It was entertaining in a ridiculous way.

He admitted not reading the script before accepting "as putting kids through college is expensive". Second Captains referred to it I think.

[FrankBurke]

"Room" Tough viewing. Gripping. Will stay with you. Excellent.

[Donny B.]

"Room" Tough viewing. Gripping. Will stay with you. Excellent.

Agreed. Of all the Oscar contenders I think it's the best film.

[Oldschoolsocks]

If anyone else was waiting, like me, for Predestination to be released on SKY movies do yourself a favour and watch the Usual Suspects again, while thinking of looper. It's pure patronising shite. Shame too I had to sit through it AND pretend to like because it was my turn to pick out the film, and I was f%~ked if I was gonna sit through another episode of scandal instead. Feel all cheap and nasty just thinking about it.

[Peg Leg]

Right so, here goes. Batman vs superman is the best comic adaptation put to film ever..... if you're a dcu reader you will love it. Studio pressure to tee up JLA is too obvious and shoe horned though.

[paddyor]

JLA?

Have only heard some lex Luther and he sounds cr@p.